


Superman/Animal Man: Bugs from Hell

by Brawl2099



Category: Superman (Comics)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-30
Updated: 2018-05-30
Packaged: 2019-05-16 03:36:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,929
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14803641
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Brawl2099/pseuds/Brawl2099
Summary: Superman and Animal Man are asked for help in a situation that has gotten out of control.





	Superman/Animal Man: Bugs from Hell

Buddy Baker watched Kal-El as Superman strode over the Antarctic ice. The polar wind had caught his cape, and sent it billowing out to his side. Snow floated around him, making him seem even more alien and aloof than Buddy was used to. He shivered out of reflex, but he wasn’t really cold. Through the Red, he was channeling a Polar Bear, and the morphogenic field surrounded him with the bear like a blanket. Superman glanced back over his shoulder.  
“You coming Buddy?” he asked with a wry grin.  
“Yeah, right behind you,” he said. “Just confused why you called me in.” He jogged to catch up to Superman. He looked at him, his smile changing from amused to warm.  
“I need someone with your abilities to help in this situation, for one,” he said. “And I called you first assuming you might need to stretch your wings. Literally or figuratively.” He shrugged. Buddy got another chill, this one out of excitement. Superman wanted HIM to tag along. That was like Jeter requesting him to be his designated runner.  
“So what’s going on?”  
“Let’s get inside and I’ll fill you entirely in.”  
FAUX DC PRESENTS  
A CELEBRATION OF SUPERMAN’S BIRTHDAY

SUPERMAN Special 2016

Guest Starring

ANIMAL MAN

In  
“Bugs from Hell”  
By Tony Thornley

 

The Slab loomed large over them as they continued to walk through the snow. The main door slid open, and they could see the warden of the prison waiting for them.  
Shilo Norman was a tall man with chocolate skin and a shorn head. He wore a thick parka, and glasses on the bridge of his nose. Clark knew him as the second Mister Miracle as well, but that was a detail that he kept quiet from the UN when they rehired him to oversee the Slab again. He extended his hand, and the two embraced.  
“Kal, it’s wonderful to see you again,” he said.  
“The same!” Superman said. “I wish it was better circumstances, naturally.”  
“Yes, of course,” Shilo said. He extended a hand to Buddy. “Animal Man, welcome to the Slab. I imagine you’re wondering what you’re needed for here.”  
Buddy could feel something… off with the Red now that they had reached the prison. The morphogenic field was altered, and just… wrong.  
“I have a suspicion,” he said. Shilo nodded and led them inside.  
“We had a prisoner transfer about a week ago,” he said as they walked into the prison. The door slid shut behind them. “Roderick Rose was among them.”  
“That name doesn’t ring a bell,” Buddy said.  
“Hellgrammite,” Superman said. “Former entomologist, specializing in grasshoppers. As scientists are apt to do, he distilled a solution that would endow him with physical attributes of a grasshopper, and the mutated him into a monster.”  
“You do know most people wouldn’t have spoken that sentence with a straight face ten years ago?” Buddy said.   
Kal smirked. “Well aware of that.”  
“Well, Rose gets into his cell, and builds a nest,” Norman continued. “Real nasty smelling thing. Thank goodness he was isolated from other prisoners. We send a team in to clean it out and it doesn’t go so good.”  
“Four guards, six technicians and an admin are all pulled into his next before they can seal him off,” Kal finished for Norman. “Hellgrammite was enhanced and altered by Neron a few years ago. Honestly, those eleven people are probably lost to us now.”  
“And with what we know about Rose… he’s probably got a whole hive of monster bugs down there now.”  
Buddy nodded. He began flipping through his personal mental filing system, trying to find a single bit of information. What hunted grasshoppers most effectively? He grinned as the Red responded.  
The forces of nature had a sense of humor.  
The first thing to come to mind was wild turkeys.  
The second, after battling away an image of Superman watching him rush into battle with a gobble, was actually several options- red tailed hawk, American toads, and the northern ringneck snake. All good options.  
“Well I’m glad to help,” he said. “Why do you need me though Big Blue? This seems like a pretty easy gig for you.”  
“Hellgrammite was one of the many villains enhanced by Neron a few years ago,” he said. “We still don’t fully understand what the demon did to those he enhanced and altered. In a confined space such as this, I really don’t want to take my chances with a possibly-magic insect monster alone.”  
“Fair enough,” Buddy said. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He reached out to the Red and it answered. He exhaled, opened his eyes, and smiled. “I’m ready when you are.”  
Superman grinned at Shilo. He twisted his head, stretching his neck, and popped his knuckles.  
“Let’s go.”  
=\S/=

Buddy was starting to regret drawing on the hawk. He had only thought of how badass it would be, and not how it could tolerate the enclosed space of the prison, particularly as they drew closer to Hellgrammite’s nest.  
Superman looked at him.  
“You okay?” he asked. “Your heartbeat is speeding up.”  
“I synched up with a bird of prey,” he shrugged. “It’s not liking this hallway.” Kal stopped.  
“Do you need to take a minute?”  
“No, I can switch on the fly,” he said. He croaked loudly and laughed. “A toad will work just as well, don’t you think?”  
He smirked. “I’m glad you’re here,” he said. “We’ve barely interacted in the past.”  
“Yeah, team ups are fun,” Buddy laughed. They continued deeper into the prison. It got darker as they walked. Shilo had evacuated the prison from this point forward. Inmates were required to double up, and the guards had retreated behind a riot barrier. It was all them.  
They walked in silence, and the dark started to feel tangible. The air began to feel hot, and the humidity was steadily rising. The silence had given way to a steady, unnerving chirp. Buddy recognized it, as he’d used the chirp himself in the past. It was the chirp of locusts.  
“Kal, something wrong,” he whispered. “That’s not grasshopper noises. That’s locust noises. And you know what locusts do.”  
“They swarm and they consume everything in their path.” Superman stopped. Buddy stopped alongside him. He resisted the urge to crouch on all fours and croak again. In the sudden stillness, he realized that the Red had become uneasy.  
“Roderick,” Kal finally called into the dark. “We’re just here to talk.”  
“Talk. That’s always how it starts.”  
“I know,” he said. He glanced at Buddy. He was feeling the unease as well. “I know you’re built a nest, and I know you’re holding innocent people in there. We just want those people. Then we’ll give you this space as your own.”  
“They are gone. They were incubators.”  
Superman hung his head and Buddy’s gut sunk. Eleven lives snuffed out. But that meant… He synched back with the hawk, sharing the avian and amphibian for several moments.  
“Kal, we’re surrounded.”  
“I know,” Superman said. He looked back up, and his eyes glowed red. For the first time in his life, Buddy was scared of Superman.  
“Roderick, those were people! You knew that! Why?”  
“They facilitated the first of my children.”  
Superman’s lips curled in anger. He blasted the corridor with his heat vision, illuminating the nest as the twin beams obliterated it. In the wake of the blast, the strange material starting burning, illuminating their monstrous target.  
“They were people!”  
“They were the first of a new race!”  
Hellgrammite jumped at Superman with a roar. He tackled Kal and began pummelling him. He took the beating for a moment, then blasted him away with his heat vision.  
Buddy looked around. The flames illuminated the larvae crawling towards him, slime trails and all. They were large slug-like creatures, about a foot long each, with no eyes, and a round mouth full of jagged teeth at the end. He gagged, but he could tell whatever they were, they weren’t connected to the Red. That made the next part easy.  
He dropped to all fours and leapt. He hit the first two hard, causing them to explode in a gush of viscera and gore. One of the larvae flexed and jumped into the air at his face. He spun and kicked it away. It slammed into the wall and fell limp.  
“Kal, whatever they are, they’re not natural! They’re not of the Red.”  
Superman glanced at him and nodded. He grabbed Hellgrammite by the throat and lifted him away from his chest. He floated into the air and righted himself. His eyes were still glowing red. The creature clawed at him and hissed.  
“Eleven people you have MURDERED,” he growled. “And more if it was your wont. This ends now.”  
He threw Hellgrammite against the wall and blew, freezing him in place.  
He turned back to Buddy, his cape flowing around him. “Thank you Buddy.” He took another deep breath and exhaled, freezing much of the nest.  
“Let’s find the bodies and get them out of there…”  
=\S/=  
Buddy watched as they wheeled Hellgrammite out of cell block and towards the medical bay. He was in a New Genesis hibernation pod, a technology that Buddy wasn’t even aware existed.  
“What’s going to happen to him?” he asked, turned to his right and looking at Shilo.  
“He’s going to stay there until we find a way to reverse the alterations he and Neron made,” he said. “I’ve already put in a couple calls. Either Jason Blood or Zatanna will be able to make it by the end of the week. Then he’ll he tried for the murders of my people.”  
“Damn,” Buddy muttered. He turned and looked at the sheet draped bodies of the people they’d recovered from the nest. “Did they have families?”  
“Some did, some didn’t,” Shilo said. “I’ll be travelling up to the States tonight to deliver the bad news.” He took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes. “Worst part of my job, but they all knew the risks, working around metas.” He replaced his glasses and looked up at Superman. He stood over their bodies, his head hung low. “It’s weighing heavily on the big guy’s shoulders, isn’t it?”  
“Yeah,” he nodded. He reached up to his goggles, and removed them, then pulled his cowl down so it hung loosely around his neck. “I’ll talk to him.”  
He walked over to Superman, and placed a hand on his shoulder.  
“They were probably gone the moment he grabbed them,” he said, turning to look at Buddy. “But I still feel guilty that I wasn’t able to stop it. That I wasn’t able to be there.”  
“I know,” he said. “This is kind of why I’ve mostly retired. The guilt kills.”  
“Yeah, it does,” he smiled. “But know what would be worse for me?”  
“What’s that?”  
“Not being there at all,” he said. “Not helping everyone I can. Having all this power, and doing nothing with it.”  
Buddy whistled. “Good point. Thanks for the guilt trip.”  
Superman laughed. “Sorry, not my intent. But thank you again.” He suddenly perked up. “Dammit, a dam just broke in Singapore. I need to go. Can you get back to the JLA transporter okay?”  
“Yeah, but… I’ve never been to Singapore before.”  
Superman smiled. “That’s the spirit.”  
=\S/=  
As he channelled a gorilla and a cheetah, he ran away from the rapidly rising water, a child on each shoulder. He looked up in the sky and grinned at Superman.  
“Damn, he’s good,” he laughed.  
=\S/=


End file.
